Will my employer find out about a Korean sex crime case?

What Korean law says

Article 56(4): the central or local government body, superintendent or office of education that handles authorisation, permission, registration or reporting for child and youth related institutions must request a sexual offence record check from the relevant authority in respect of a person who intends to operate one.

Article 56(5): the head of a child or youth related institution must verify the sexual offence record of a person who is employed there or in fact providing labour there, and of a person who intends to do so, and in that case must request the record check from the relevant authority with the person’s consent. There is an exception where the person submits the reply to the record check themselves.

Article 56(1) and (2) create the underlying employment restriction order, pronounced with the judgment and limited to ten years.

Act on the Protection of Children and Youth against Sexual Abuse, Article 56. Act No. 21108, in force from 12 May 2026.

What usually happens in practice

Note what triggers the check: it is the type of workplace, not a tip-off. Schools, kindergartens and comparable institutions are required to check, and the consent requirement in paragraph 5 does not make the check optional in practice, because declining consent in that setting is itself an answer.

Outside that category most employers learn nothing from the state. What they do learn tends to come from elsewhere: an absence during a detention period, a residence status that changes, or a disclosure clause in a contract or professional licence. Those are worth checking early, because the obligations there can bite before the criminal case resolves.

A case that ends without charges does not generate a record of this kind. The checking system in Article 56 is built around convictions and the orders that follow them, which is another reason the charging decision is the stage that matters most.

What you should do next

• Work out whether your workplace is a child or youth related institution. That single fact decides most of this.
• Read your own contract and any licence conditions for disclosure obligations.
• Plan how an absence would be explained if detention becomes a possibility.
• Concentrate effort on the charging decision. Most disclosure consequences follow a conviction, not an allegation.

Written and reviewed by Soobin You, Attorney at YUSU Lawfirm. Former prosecutor. Last legal review: 12 September 2026.